In his sermon titled 'When God Became Flesh - The Incarnation,' Jason Dohm explores the profound mystery of the incarnation, where Jesus Christ, as God the Son, took on human form without relinquishing His divinity. The sermon draws from John 1, Isaiah 9 and 11, and Revelation to illustrate how Jesus is both eternal and temporal, both the root and branch of Jesse, and both Lamb and Shepherd. Dohm explains that Jesus, as the 'Everlasting Father,' establishes a new spiritual family, offering salvation to humanity. The sermon emphasizes the depth and complexity of Jesus' dual nature and the necessity for individuals to recognize their need for salvation, respond to the Gospel, and entrust themselves to Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.

The title of the message this morning is When God Became Flesh. It's just drawing on the language that Tyler just read out of John chapter one. Today we're considering the incarnation. God the Son, so God being existing in Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, God the Son, Jesus, taking on humanity, becoming human without ceasing to be God. So we're already in mind-bending territory, okay?

How is he going to take on humanity without ceasing to be God? And doing that, becoming human without ceasing to be God, doing that in order to save humans who desperately need saving. So when we talk about the incarnation, that's what we're talking about. Jesus doing that in order to save humans who desperately need saving. And John 1 is probably the most classic text.

The first part, verses 1 through 3, says that in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. So Jesus there becomes very clear as you continue to read in John chapter one that the Word is what John is calling Jesus. So Jesus was with God in the beginning and he was God. So it's a declaration of Jesus being eternal and Jesus being God. And then in verse 14, we see that the word or Jesus became flesh.

He took on flesh to dwell here, to dwell among us. His name elsewhere is Emmanuel, God with us. So he came to be with us. And when he was here, humanity beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth." So that is the most famous text on the incarnation. For our time today, I'm going to take you to three other texts that help us consider Jesus the God man.

And there will be two in Isaiah, one in Revelation. And they just teach us a lot about what it means for God the Son, Jesus Christ, to leave heaven and assume humanity, become human without ceasing to be God and what that means. So as we come to this deep well, this is one of those wells, you look down in it and then you let down all the lime that you've got and you haven't hit the bottom and you have no idea how much further it is to the bottom. There's not a bottom, I think, on this well. So we're looking down into that well today.

Let's pray that God would help us. God, if we could understand everything about you, we would know that this isn't the infinite God. I'm not disturbed at all that I can't understand everything about the God who made the stars that we see on a beautiful clear night. Many things not revealed, but you have revealed this about yourself, and I thank you and I pray that you would enter into this time helping us to see things clearly from your word in Jesus' name, amen. Well, if you wanna see the words yourselves, you can turn to Isaiah 9.

We're going to be in Isaiah 9, then Isaiah 11. I'll be reading Isaiah chapter nine, verses six and seven, and Then talking about them. Isaiah chapter 9 verses 6 and 7, follow along. Unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. I could go without saying that this deserves a whole sermon all to itself. We're not doing that today. But there's a lot to be said here, most of which I won't say. But here, when we're considering the incarnation, or God taking on flesh, becoming flesh, I wanna zero in on the son and the father in this text.

And this is mysterious but not so mysterious now that we can look back through our lenses of the New Testament and we can see, oh that's what it's talking about. Verse 6 says, For unto us a child is born unto us a son is given. So we're learning here God is speaking raised up the prophet Isaiah speaking through this prophet And he's revealing that a son has been given to humanity. Later in the same verse, this son among other wonderful things, we've got a list of the wonderful things that this given son will be. One of those is that he will be called everlasting father.

So he's a son, he's given to humanity, but his name will be called everlasting father. So it makes me think, okay, which is it? Is he a son or is he a father? The answer, of course, is yes. He is a son and he's a father.

He's both. In Luke 1, when the angel Gabriel appears to Mary, he says that this child will, quote, be great and will be called the Son of the Highest and that the Holy Spirit will come upon Mary and the power of the Highest will overshadow her therefore also that holy one who is to be born will be called the Son of God this son who is given to humanity will be the Son of God that's why he's actually called mighty God That's another name in the list here, Mighty God. Jesus is the Son that is given, given by God the Father. That's the sense in which he is the Son. He is the eternal Son of God, given by God the Father.

Again, I just mentioned this, but I'll repeat it in verse six. He is the Son given and yet his name is called Mighty God. Mighty God. Okay, that's straightforward enough. Jesus is the Son given.

But wait, how is He then also the everlasting Father? Anyone used to thinking of Jesus as the everlasting father, not me? First, let me say that this isn't as strange as it first appears. Every human father is also a son, correct? So, it's not impossible.

In fact, it's normal for a son to also be a father. I certainly am. I am the son of Linus and Carol Dome And the father of Megan, Anna, Jake, Laura, Becca, Abby, don't get me started on my grandchildren. Okay then. In what way is Jesus a father and an everlasting father at that.

Here's what the apostle Paul says in Romans 5. The apostle Paul in Romans 5 says that when all of us are born, Adam is our father, meaning he's the head of our race, The human race. You are born into Adam's family. He's the father of this family. If you go, father, grandfather, great grandfather, great great grandfather, all the way upstream to where there's nowhere more upstream to go, you're at Adam.

He is the father of this race. The problem is when he brought sin into the world, he brought corruption into himself and to his children, his grandchildren, his great-grandchildren, and all that corruption has made it down to us. So the Bible teaches that we sin because we're sinners, not that we're sinners because we sin. Okay, that's really confusing, but I'm going to say it again because it's important. And it's fundamental to the teaching of Scripture.

We sin because we're sinners. We came out of our mother's womb with a nature received down through the ages, down through the family tree, with all sorts of corruption. In a sense, you didn't stand a chance against sin because you are inclined towards it. So the sin, your individual sins are just proof of what you're like. That's really what's terrible.

It's bad enough that we're sinners. It's worse that that's just evidence of who we are in our heart of hearts. So it's not that we're sinners because we sin. There was nothing wrong with us and then we sinned, so now we're sinners. That's not what the Bible teaches.

The Bible teaches that sin is just the evidence of what we're like, of what we love and what we hate. We love all the wrong things and we hate so many of the right things. And if you just give a little baby time to prove it, he or she will prove it. Almost at the soonest moment possible. I knew a family that had twins and they could tell them apart because of bite marks.

Bite marks. Baby twins in a crib, as soon as they have teeth, will bite each other. What's wrong with us? The Bible actually tells us what's wrong with us. This is what's wrong with us.

Our problem as we come out of the womb is that Adam is our Father. The Bible doesn't leave it at that because God hasn't left it at that. By faith, by entrusting yourself to Jesus who He is as God who has taken on flesh and what he's done, living a life without sin and then bleeding and dying for sinners, Jesus becomes your family head in this new rescued family. So for those who have entrusted themselves to Jesus, who he is and what he's done, you were born with Adam as your head and it meant you were all kind of corrupt. But by entrusting yourself to Jesus, Jesus has become the new head of your family and he's the everlasting father to you.

This is wonderful what's being said in Isaiah 9. You don't have to stay Adam's child, a son of Adam or a daughter of Adam. You can become a son of this everlasting father. The headwaters of your family tree doesn't have to be Adam forever. You can change families.

This is the glory of the gospel is you can change families and stop being Adam, son or daughter, and start being Jesus Christ, son or daughter, in the sense that he's the head of your family line because you've been raised from the dead spiritually as of who he is and what he's done. One last observation from Isaiah 9. Look at the very end of verse 7. It says, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this.

What does that mean? That means that God has a zeal to give His Son unto us. A son is given. God has a zeal to give his son to be the great eternal saving king of his people. Meaning God is not in any way reluctant to give his son to save his people.

And He has a zeal for it. So anyone who has ever thought of God as a reluctant savior, banish the thought. He's not a reluctant savior. He has a zeal to give his son to be the saving eternal King of his people. So that is Jesus the God-man, God who became flesh, as a man, a son given, As God, an everlasting father, the head of a new, rescued family.

We're on just glorious ground here. We should all take our shoes off. This is holy ground. Actually, do not take your shoes off. Isaiah 11.

Thank you, Owen. Every week, if you're a visitor here, every week I tell about one joke, a sermon, and Owen always laughs, and I appreciate it. Isaiah 11. I'm going to be reading Isaiah 11 verses 1 and 2 and then skipping to verse 10. And then we'll walk through it.

Isaiah 11 verses 1 and 2. There shall come forth a rod from the stem of Jesse and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. Now skipping to verse 10. And in that day, there shall be a root of Jesse, who shall stand as a banner to the people, for the Gentiles shall seek him and his resting place shall be glorious." Here in Isaiah 11, we have a branch and a root.

So in Isaiah 9, we had a son and a father. Jesus is the eternal son of God, but also the father of the new spiritual family. Here in Isaiah 11, we have a branch and a root. So let's ask Isaiah based on what he's written here. Isaiah, what is coming?

God is showing you the future. Isaiah, what is coming? Verse one. A rod from a stem is coming. A branch from a trunk, okay, just changing the words, Okay, a branch is coming, it's going to grow off of a trunk.

So Think of a tree. The branch or the rod is way down the line. When you look at a tree, the branches all originate in and grow out of the stem or the trunk. That's how trees work. Okay, you have the trunk and branches grow out of them.

So every branch originates in and grows out of the stem or the trunk. So this coming branch will originate from and grow out of the stem of Jesse. Who's Jesse? David's dad. King David's dad was Jesse.

Whoever this one that Isaiah is talking about is going to originate in and grow out of the trunk of Jesse. Jesse will have a son. David, David will have a son. Solomon, Solomon will have a son. Rehoboam, all those are kings.

And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, when you study the Old Testament history, most of that is this line of kings and Jesse, David's dad, is the trunk and there are branches that come off of kings, kings, kings, kings, a line of Kings. Now this is a very special branch. Look at the description in verse 2. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon this branch. The Spirit of wisdom and understanding will be on this branch.

The spirit of counsel and might will be on this branch. The spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. If you read about the other kings they don't fit the bill. Study your Old Testament. What a branch from the trunk or the stem of Jesse this will be the line of kings.

Now verse 10 describing the same coming person. So this is my argument. I think the context, if you read it, look at it carefully, you'll come to the same conclusion. This isn't a different person. This is the same person being spoken of, describing the same person in verse 10.

This Same person is called the root of Jesse. Okay, so he was the branch from Jesse in one and now he's the root of Jesse in verse 10. So where did Jesse, the trunk of the tree, come from? Came from where all tree trunks come from? Came from the root.

We were looking at the tree. We saw the trunk, Jesse, and the branches came from it, but no tree begins with a trunk. You know what you call a tree that begins with a trunk. You call it a telephone pole. It's been severed from the roots and they hang power lines on it.

This root of Jesse will be sought by the Gentiles. Now the connections to Jesus are getting really obvious. Who's going to be the one in the line of kings who will be sought by the Gentiles. So Isaiah speaking as God's prophet, God put the words of God in this prophet's mouth, raised him up to speak these things, says, someone is coming who comes from Jesse and who Jesse comes from. That's not how it works.

That's not how family trees work. You either come from someone in a family line or they come from you. One or the other. Pick one. Did you come from that one or did they come from you and the family tree?

But Isaiah is saying someone is coming from Jesse who Jesse came from. Oh my. What are we going to make of this? By the way, as a bonus, he'll be the hope of the Gentiles. He'll be the hope of the Gentiles.

Now I want you to consider two New Testament passages. I talked about looking through our New Testament lenses now that Jesus has come and lots of things have become clear that would have been really confusing before Jesus came. I want to consider two New Testament passages. Just listen to them. The first is Matthew 22 verses 41 through 46.

Matthew 22 verses 41 through 46. While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying, What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? So here's the scene. Jesus the Christ is asking the Pharisees what they think about the Christ.

The Christ is asking them, what do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? They said to him, the son of David. It's actually a really good answer. That is the right answer.

You can prove that a bunch of places in the Old Testament that the promised Savior would be from the line of kings would be a son of David. Jesus said to them, How then does David in the spirit call him Lord, saying, The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. If David then calls him Lord, how is he his son? And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day on did anyone dare question him." So, the context is they've been trying to stump Jesus, okay? So then, it sort of reads like Jesus has had enough, so he just decides to see if they can answer a single question from him.

So he quotes, he asks them, whose son will the Christ be? They say the son of David. It's the right answer. And he says, OK, but David, the author of Psalm 110 says this, and he quotes the beginning of Psalm 110. Then why would David said, The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool.

And all of the Pharisees knew this was talking about the promised Savior. Universally accepted. This is talking about the Christ. Okay, well if the Christ will be David's son, how will David call him Lord? That's not how Honor flows.

Honor flows from son to father. Sons are supposed to honor their fathers. But you're saying David is rendering the honor to one of his sons. Status genealogy. OK, Pharisees, you're so smart.

Explain that. They can't answer him. They decide it's too dangerous to ask him questions. They don't ask him any more questions. Too dangerous.

It's clear he knows stuff we don't know. We're not asking him any more questions. But what is the answer? The answer is that the branch of Jesse promised is also the root of Jesse. So that David is right to honor a great-great-great-great-grandson.

Because that great-great-great-grandson is no normal descendant. It's the root from which his forefathers came. Okay, this is David speaking as a prophet in Psalm 110. It's saying the same thing that Isaiah 11 is saying. Listen to this.

John 8 verses 56 through 59. John 8 verses 56 through 59. Jesus says to the Jews, Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad. And the Jews said to him, You are not yet fifty years old and have you seen Abraham? Jesus said to them, most assuredly I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.

Then they took up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple going through the midst of them and so passed by. If you think the Jews wanted to kill Jesus because they didn't understand him, You've got it all wrong. The Jews wanted to kill Jesus because they understood exactly what he was saying. I am God. Why are they taking up stones here?

Because he said before Abraham was, I am. Do you know how long Abraham lived before Jesus? Two thousand years! He's claiming to be God. Go get the rocks!

Here's the timeline. Abraham 2, 000 years before Jesus. David 1, 000 years before Jesus. Isaiah 7 to 800 years before Jesus. Speaking about Jesus.

Things that he couldn't possibly know about Jesus and how this one promised by God to save would be both the root of Jesse. Jesse would come from him as all humans do and he would be the branch he would actually come and take on flesh and be part of a family genealogy be part of a family tree even though he made the whole tree every tree and we've all got a family tree Jesus is at the root of all of them. John chapter 1 said that. Without Him nothing was made that was made. If it was made, Jesus made it.

Every family tree rooted, felt Like life comes from him. So that is Jesus, the God-man, the God who became flesh, as man, the branch of Abraham. As man, he was a descendant of Abraham, a Jew. As man, the branch of Jesse, the trunk of kings, the son of David. As God, The root of Abraham, the root of Jesse, the root of David.

By the way, this is actually how the whole Bible ends. Listen to Revelation 22 verse 16. Revelation 22 is the last chapter of the Bible. There's nothing but your concordance after Revelation chapter 22. Verse 16 is almost at the end of the very last chapter of the Bible.

So this is literally the ending of the Bible. Revelation 2 16. I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star. In the last part of the last chapter of the Bible, Jesus is still identifying himself as the root and the offspring of David.

This is the God man. Finally, Revelation 17 verse 7. Revelation 17, excuse me, Revelation chapter 7 verse 17. For the lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them to living fountains of water. The lamb who's in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

Here we have a lamb who is also a shepherd. In this verse there is a lamb on the throne, so he's ruling, the lamb rules, who shepherds people to living water. Again, that's not how it works. How it works. You're either a lamb who is protected and cared for by a shepherd, or a shepherd whose job is to protect and care for lambs.

One or the other, pick one. But here again Jesus, the God man, the God who took on flesh, is both lamb and shepherd. We don't have to pick one. In John chapter 1 verse 29, John the Baptist sees Jesus coming towards him and he says, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Here comes a Lamb that's taking away the sins of the world.

What does he mean? Jesus is the Lamb of God. He's Reaching into this rich Old Testament testimony of the sacrificial system where you would take a lamb, but not just any lamb, had to be in the first year and it had to be male and without blemish. If you had a crippled lamb and you offered that, it was an affront to God. It had to be a lamb completely without blemish and you would come and you would kill it.

Why? Because an innocent one could die for the guilty. God would accept the punishment of the innocent in the place of the person who did the crime. Someone who was defiled by sin could come and you had this picture of something undefiled without blemish, without spot, you would kill that innocent thing, that innocent lamb So that the guilty one could go free as if they never did the crime John the Baptist is saying Jesus is the reality of that all those lambs, lamb blood can't pardon people. It never did, never will, never could.

But it was a picture to point forward to and teach about what God is going to do in the fullness of time, at just the right time, He'll send this Savior that He's been promising for 2, 000 years to send. Jesus will come at just the right time to do, to fulfill the picture of what the killing of these lambs has been pointing forward to and teaching about. Jesus is that. John chapter 10, Jesus says, I am the good shepherd And I know my sheep and am known by them. He protects and cares for, lays down his life for his sheep here in Revelation seven, and he leads them to fountains of living water.

So that is Jesus, the God-man, God who took on flesh as man, The Lamb of God whose blood cleanses from sin. How could he come and be a substitute for a sinner if he wasn't a man? If he wasn't a human, how could he come bear the sins of a human like me, as God, the shepherd who protects and cares for those he has cleansed with his blood. As man, he comes as the lamb sheds his blood. As God, he shepherds those he's cleansed with his blood.

So Jesus really is the reason for the season. That God would send his son, a son is given, that God would have a zeal to send his son to take on flesh and live a life with no guilt so that he would have none of his own sins to die for, so that he could offer himself as a substitute, not a sinner dying for another sinner, how could that work, but a lamb without spot or blemish, standing in the place of taking the sins upon himself of one who was guilty. That is certainly worth a great annual celebration. If anything ever was, this is. But I think it's woefully inadequate for me to just stop there.

I should ask you, does that have anything to do with you? We should ask ourselves, does this have anything to do with me personally, individually? Yes, Jesus came to die for sinners. Yes. Hell will still be full.

Yes. For people who never felt their desperate need and so they never fled to Him for mercy. It was available. He called. They wouldn't go to him for life.

Jesus said, I came for the sick, not the healthy. Oh, and by the way, the Bible teaches no one's healthy. No one's healthy. All of us are so far from healthy. If you knew what was wrong with you, you would go to Jesus for healing.

Amen. The gospel is precious. It doesn't have anything to do with you. You have to respond to the gospel. You have to actually Entrust yourself to the lamb who came to bleed and die for sinners.

You actually have to respond to the gospel. What does that look like? You agree with God? God, the Bible says a lot of really ugly things about me. You know what?

You're right about all of them. It's a hard pill to swallow. Most people don't want, most people want to go to heaven with their pride. I don't know what to offer you. I can't offer you what the Bible offers you.

You have to set that aside and swallow what the Bible says about you. If you think you're not in desperate need, Jesus has nothing to offer you. If you feel the weight of what it would look like from God's perspective to be perfectly good from eternity past and will be perfectly good through eternity future. And then know how selfish you are, how proud you are, and how God hates these things, and how though we're comfortable with them, He's never comfortable with them. So somebody's going to die for these sins.

Who will it be? Christmas is wonderful, but you have to respond for it to have anything to do with you. Anything to do with you. Let's pray. God, I thank you for Isaiah 9, Son given, everlasting father, the start of a new family, a clean family, because of the work of the head of that family.

Thank you for Isaiah 11, the branch of the line of kings but also the root of the line of kings. Thank you for Revelation 7, the lamb who rules from the throne, and shepherds, these people that he's cleansed with his own blood. Pray that this would actually have something to do with us, that we would have responded to the gospel, thrown ourselves on your mercy. And then that You would help us to follow you, walk with you, as evidence that we really have new hearts. Pray in Jesus' name, amen.